home hum

This morning our beloved "Snuggles" suffered a massive heart attack and died instantly.  He was twelve years old.  It was so unexpected.  We are all heartbroken.  

knitting a new world, one stitch at a time

Photo by:Yoon S. Byun/ Globe Staff 

On the front page of the Globe this morning I read a story that made me smile.  It was about a group of graffiti knitters in Boston's South End:  "Watch your streets--knitters are on the loose". That headline alone filled my imagination with knitters taking over the streets, needles and yarn flying, painting the world over with colorful fiber.  I'd heard of this before, but this morning I stopped and took the time to learn about yarn bombing.  

I love the idea of knitted surprises around every corner...each small knitted flower, heart, and loop a secret connection to "my people"--and an invitation to others to join.

What if I put a bird in every tree at the park this year?  What if little children, grumpy old men, and tired workers found them and took them home?!  What if I planted crocheted flowers this spring along with bean and cucumber seeds?  What do you think might grow?

still winter

I've heard that in some places, spring is on its way.

But, this morning it was 13F when I woke up and came downstairs.  I looked at the calendar page: February 22nd, still winter.  Still time for sparkling, swirling snowflakes to dance against the window panes. Still time for steaming cups of hot cocoa, hearty kettles of soup for supper, and baked oatmeal for breakfast:

  Baked Oatmeal

• 3 c. rolled oats
• 1 c. brown sugar
• 2 t. baking powder
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 c. oil (you can substitute all or part applesauce)
• 1 c. milk

Mix all ingreidents and pour into a greased 8 x 8 pan.  Bake 30 minutes at 350 degrees. You can add dried fruit (I like golden raisins and dried cranberries), spices, or whatever you like.  

Still time to snuggle under a warm quilt with a good book, play board games, watch the birds at the feeder, and go sledding.  Still time to be present and savor these winter days before the sun claims them back, and it's spring.   

 
 
 

I want to learn how to paint like this

 

2.13 - 2.19 week in review

Home Learning:

• History--Began a new study on ancient thought/ideas beginning with Confucius.  So far, we've just covered the introduction, but I'm really excited about diving into this topic with A and Z.  
• Science--A and E began a study of human anatomy.  On Friday we went to the Museum of Science.  I purchased a membership and plan to take advantage of it throughout this year.  Our next visit is planned for the Friday after next.  E loved the butterfly garden best.  A loved the exhibit on human reproduction.  Z liked the lightning show and electicity/weather exhibits.  L was captivated by the lunar landing exhibit and the space capsule replica.  --Lots of learning topics to follow-up on and expand upon.  
• Writing--I bought new blank moleskines for everyone to begin a journaling project.  I plan to use some of the ideas from the book, Rip the Page!  Adventures in Creative Writing.  We write a lot, but I want my children to see the play and endless possibilities in writing.        
• Record Keeping--I've redesigned our weekly checklist to follow a by-subject format instead of our usual by-day format.  I hope that this will provide my children with a greater sense of independence and more control over what they do when.  

Homemaking:

A bought a new cookbook of vegetarian recipes.  She made us a delicious dish called Potato Cake for supper one night.  

I re-decorated our upstairs bathroom, with my older children's help.  A and S went with me to pick out new shower and window curtains, and bathroom accessories, and Z helped me paint. The bathroom is now a soothing pale aqua with sprout green accents.   (It used to be a deep taupe color with plum accents.)  I love the new look, especially the lightness of the colors we chose.  The room is small, so it's hard to get a good photo, but these show the colors pretty well:

My favorite accessory is this soap dispenser.  When you push on the pump he croaks:

 
Family:

My father went into the hospital on Tuesday for frost-bitten toes (yes, he lives in Syracuse) and ended up having vascular surgery on his left leg on Thursday.  There was some arterial blockage (he's a diabetic).  He's still in the hospital.  The doctor is waiting to see whether his toes will recover or not. The past year my dad's had a lot of health challenges.  Last spring he was diagnosed with cancer and had a large segment of his colon removed.  It's been very stressful for my mom. I'm actually more worried about her than I am about him.  My dad's like a rubber ball; he always bounces back.  

Fun: 

• We made decorations and exchanged Valentine's on Monday.
• We enjoyed playing outside in the sunshine two days this week when the temps soared to nearly sixty degrees!  About half of the snow melted (there is still about a foot and a half on the ground).
• We had a popcorn party to kick off the new season of Survivor on Wednesday. 
• Z, S, and I went to see Robert Randolph and The Family Band perform at The House of Blues Thursday night.  It was AWESOME!  I'm so glad that I went.
• Paul took Z and S to see Liam Neeon's new movie, Unknown.  They all enjoyed it, but S advised me to wait for it to come out on DVD.  

where I come from

I grew up in Upstate New York--in Syracuse, which is one of the snowiest cities in the world, and THE snowiest city of its size (or larger) in the United States.  Syracuse is even snowier than Anchorage, Alaska. In December alone--a single month--they received over 70 inches of snow.  One of my friends from "back home" sent me the following amusement.  Trust me, it's only funny because it's TRUE:  
 
 65 above zero:
 Floridians turn on the heat.
 People in Upstate New York plant gardens.
 
 60 above zero:
 Californians shiver uncontrollably.
 People in Upstate New York sunbathe.
  
 50 above zero:
 Italian & English cars won't start.
 People in Upstate New York drive with the windows down.
  
 40 above zero:
 Georgians don coats, thermal underwear, gloves, and wool hats.
 People in Upstate New York throw on a flannel shirt.
  
 35 above zero:
 New York city landlords finally turn up the heat.
 People in Upstate New York have the last cookout before it gets cold.
  
 20 above Zero:
 People in Miami all die.
 Upstate New Yorkers close the windows.
  
 Zero:
 Californians fly away to Mexico.
 People in Upstate New York get out their winter coats.
  
 10 below zero:
 Hollywood disintegrates.
 The Girl Scouts in Upstate New York are selling cookies door to door.
  
 20 below zero:
 Washington DC runs out of hot air.
 People in Upstate New York let the dogs sleep indoors.
  
 30 below zero:
 Santa Claus abandons the North Pole.
 Upstate New Yorkers get upset because they can't start the snow-mobile.
  
 40 below zero:
 ALL atomic motion stops.> People in Upstate New York start saying...'cold enough fer ya?'
  
 50 below zero:
 Hell freezes over.
 Upstate New York public schools will open 2 hours late.

book shopping

Remember small, local bookstores?  When I was a little girl, my family frequented a shop on the northeast side of our city called The Book Nook.  The children's section was small, but it always had that special book that I needed. The shop was a sensory experience filled with that wonderful book-spice smell, you know what I mean?  And, racks of glossy bookmarks with colorful tassels, and containers filled with novely pens and pencils at the counter.  More than the bookmobile or the library, that shop fanned the flame of my love affair with paper and print.  

In this New England town, there are no small bookshops.  There is a Borders and a Barnes and Noble nearby.  The Barnes and Nobles is HUGE, and always filled with shoppers.  Finding a parking space is nearly impossible on the weekends. The stores is cavernous, with ceilings that expand upward to infinity I think. But, Borders is smaller, cozier, friendlier, and more like my memory of The Book Nook, so that is where we like to go.  

It's closing.

I'm sad.

I don't want to shop at Barnes and Noble.

I don't want to order everything from Amazon.

Has the planet tilted?  It feels like it has. 

We went today to say good-bye and to take advantage of the going-out-of-business-forever-everything-must-go-sale.  I am now consoling myself with these:

 

life with teens

Every so often my boys S (18 yrs) and Z (16 yrs) drag me out to listen to live music.  They sometimes get complimentary tickets through the music school.Tonight its tickets to see Robert Randolph and the Family Band at the House of Blues.  To be honest, I'm a little scared.  The House of Blues is a general admission/standing room only venue.  I don't like the idea of:

• driving into Boston during traffic hour
• searching and paying for parking (I know it'll be like $40 bucks)
• standing body-to-body with 2,000 other folks during 'flu season (it's true, I'm a bit of a germ freak)

I am, however, really excited about the music:

 

can schools be "fixed"?

In the Globe this morning there was an opinion piece that rattled me a bit.  The article was written by Carlo Rotella, director of American Studies at Boston College.  Recently, he had the opportunity to visit a fourth grade classroom and teach them about researching and organizing information into essay format, which is Rotella's area of expertise.  As he worked with this class of ten year olds, he was struck by the thought that elementary school is the crucial ground of learning:

As we talked about the fundamental tool kit of nonfiction writing at any level — planning a project, doing the legwork, crafting narrative and analysis, revising drafts — it was driven home to me, as it always is when I visit my kids’ classrooms, that this is where the educational action is. Elementary school is school in its purest and most important form.

By the time students get to my own classroom, as undergrads or grad students, it feels as if we’re playing out the sequel of this main drama....  

Rotella was unprepared for the  "potent chaos of their (the students') collective thought process." He described the usual fidgeting and random question pattern of the ten year old students.  He expressed concern for what he saw and the need to correct a system that does not serve its purpose,while recognizing that, " when it comes to debates about education, we know that school is vitally important, but after that fine start the clarity begins to fade."

The article ends on that note of uncertainty.  Yet, the key to understanding the problem of how to fix our schools was staring him right in the face of that fourth grade classroom.  He even identified it!  Have you ever beheld a group of ten year olds?  The physical differences among this age group can be shocking.  Some are as small as eight year olds, while others have already hit puberty.  Main stream educators ignore these physical differences, and operate under the assumption that there is no connection between brain developemnt (a physical organ) and the ability to learn!  Instead, they group children together according to age, and place them under the unrealistic expectation that they can all acquire skills and knowledge at the same rate and level.  

It is important to note that this is a problem particular to modern centralized schools with our large, age-grouped classrooms.  In the early days schools were much smaller, often only one room, and classes were almost always of mixed ages, which allowed students to learn and grow at their own pace.  Small mixed-age classrooms, however, offer challenges in classroom management and instruction.  They require teachers who are committed to their work in a unique way.  Teaching used to be a "profession", which, once upon a time, was a very special word.  Today, that word has almost completely lost its meaning, and is synonymous with white-collar workers.  But, long ago the word meant that you were a clergyman, a lawyer, a doctor, or a teacher.  It also meant that you were devoted to your work to a level that exceeded other kinds of occupations.  Often, it meant remaining unmarried.  I am not suggesting that teachers today do not work hard, or that they should be single.  I am just pointing out the changes that have occurred in our educational system since its inception.  

There are schools that do a better job of helping children learn and grow than others.  Among the alternatives are Waldorf, Montessori, and Reggio Emilia schools.  Unfortunately, the vast majority of these schools are private, and unaffordable for most families.  Could some of the principles from these educational methods be adopted by public schools?  Perhaps.  But, doing so would come at a very high price in teacher training,  and revising materials and learning environments.  In today's economic climate it wouldn't be feasible. 

And, we cannot forget that in our capitalist society education is first and foremost a business. It is more lucrative to develop and publish standardized tests and teaching materials. It is more cost efficient to warehouse children in large buildings.  It costs less to teach larger classes...I have come to the conclusion that schools will not be fixed even if they can be.  There is simply much more interest in making money than in children and learning--this is a societal value, not just held by policy makers. School in our culture has lost its primary focus of educating students and embraced a wider mission of providing health care, nutrition, and childcare.  Parents are overworked, and too tired to fight a system that offers them this kind of support, even if this same system fails to provide their children with a sound education.    

winter reprieve

Stepping outside into the 55F sunshine is like stepping into the memory of spring--except for the two and a half feet of snow on the ground.  It seems impossible that it will all melt, there is just so much of it.  It will surely take a miracle of heat and light.  Each year I am astonished when it comes. 

A and I took L outside to play.  He rode his scooter for an hour in the afternoon sunshine--the moon was out, too!  I love when that happens: the sun and moon both shining together.  He didn't want to go back inside when the time came, but the sun was going down, and the air began to feel like winter again.  I had to carry him into the house and nurse away his sorrow on the couch.  

Then the mail came, and tucked in with the bills was a sweet token of friendship to brighten our spirits:

Thank you, Kortney!  

Simple gifts are best by far, evening moon and morning star.

"happy bawentimes day!"

That's the loving greeting I received from L this morning.  

Valentine's Day at our house is a simple, happy affair with paper decorations, heart-shaped pink pancakes for breakfast, and a small gift and chocolate filled heart for each child.  

 I love how Valentine's Day arrives smack in the middle of winter, cardinal red like the birds that visit my feeders; fleeting, sweet, transforming an ordinary day into a special treat.  The sweet expressions of friendship and love, the homemade cards, the hothouse flowers, the chocolate.

Valentine Memories:

• My father asked my mother to marry him on Valentine's Day fifty-four years ago.
• When I was in high school the student council sold red carnations on Valentine's Day.  The boys would buy them and give them to the girls they liked.  One year I came home with three flowers!
• Elementary classroom Valentine parties...making decorations, bringing in cupcakes and Hawaiian punch.
• The heart-shaped box of Russell Stover chocolates that was at my place on the kitchen table every Valentine's Day during my growing up years.

What are some of yours?

do you keep a journal?

When I was about nine or ten years old I found a diary from my mother's teenage years.  It was a small five year diary with a black leather cover and a lock;  it looked like a diary--the kind of diary that, at nine, I would like to own.  There were maybe twenty entries in it, all of them very factual, chronicling daily events and visits with relatives.  At the time she lived on a dairy farm in the north country of upstate New York.  

Soon after that discovery I began my own diary in a notebook.  I would write everyday for a week, and then not again for a month or more, when I would "restart" my diary. But, unfortunately, each time I began my diary anew, my perfectionist nature prompted me to rip-out all of my old entries, so even though I wrote in a diary during much of my childhood and teen years, I never got anywhere.  I didn't truly "keep" any of my diaries, instead I developed an unhappy pattern of write and destroy.  

I carried this pattern into my adult journaling projects, too.  Over the years I've written thousands of pages and filled scores of notebooks with words,clippings, and sketches.  A few of these notebooks remain, but most of them ended up in the trash. I couldn't risk anyone finding and reading them.  I remember lying awake one night and thinking, "If I die tonight, I don't want my husband and children to read my notebooks!  Those words are not how I want to be remembered."  

No matter how positively I begin a new journal, it soon devolves into a whining, complaining mess where I vent all of my unhappy thoughts and feelings--which would be fine if that was helpful, but I have not found it to be.  I long to write a different kind of journal.  A journal that my children and husband would be happy to stumble upon, and that I would be happy to re-read myself someday.  

How to get started on such a journal?  I went to the library to search the shelves for help, and stumbled upon Alexandra Johnson's book, Leaving A Trace: On Keeping A Journal.  This book is an engaging read filled with excerpts from famous diarists, as well as practical writing prompts and tips, and information about keeping different types of journals:  gratitude journals, observation journals, travel journals, dream journals, &c.  Johnson provides encouragement and real help for writing a journal that can become a springboard of creativity and a workbook for your life.  

Let me ask you:

• Do you keep a journal?
• What is your purpose for keeping a journal/diary?  What do you call it:  journal, diary, commonplace book, &c ?
• In what do you keep it?  Notebook?  Bound book?  Moleskine?  Computer? Something else? (Of course, a blog is a journal, too, but its shared, public nature is a severely limiting factor which casts it in an entirely different category from the personal journals I am concerned with here.)
• How often do you write in it?
• What kinds of things do you record?
• Do you use a particular method? 
• What are your favorite writing tools? Pen? Pencils? Watercolor? 
• Do you include photos, clippings, &c?

looking out and in

The view from my front window after about a foot of snow melted over a balmy 40F weekend:

Can you see my mailbox peeking out from the top of the snow?  It is nice to be able to see it from the window now.  And, our road is finally bare.  But, my there is a long way to go before we see anything green outside.

But, inside S has new socks to warm his toes:

I modified Veronik Avery's and Mona Schmidt's Ribbed Sock pattern from Reynold's Steppin' Out booklet to knit from the toe-up.  I also did my usual short row heel.  The yarn is from my stash; some old Knit Picks Essential (it's called Stroll now) in Trooper Tweed.  I love the colored flecks in this yarn, and it knit up really nicely.  The finished socks are soft and a comfortable weight (not too thick).  

I really like to support my LYS (local yarn shop), but on a recent visit I just couldn't find what I wanted:  a soft sunshiny color in a cotton blend to knit a spring  sweater for L.  So, it was back to Knit Picks. The other day there was a box of sunshine waiting in my mailbox:

I plan on casting on that sweater in the coming weekend.  For now, I have these colorful socks on my needles in Opal Good Morning City:

This bright morning I have to head out to the post office to mail a Valentine to my parents.  I'm sending them the DVD of Knight and Day.  It's just the thing to beat the winter blues:  fast paced, funny, and great scenery (Tom Cruise ;- ).